MeMDRL Research Achievement made No. 1 for UTSA’s 2018 Year in Review
Date Posted: Dec. 31, 2018
Join us as we look back at the top ten news stories of 2018, and experience our biggest accomplishments once again. These stories set a rapid pace of accomplishments going into 2019 and our 50th Anniversary celebration. Here’s number one. UTSA enters Guinness World Records with smallest medical robot – The series of nanorobots was created by Soutik Betal during his doctoral research in Electrical Engineering under the guidance of professors Ruyan Guo and Amar S. Bhalla in the UTSA Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering, and they could one day lead to huge medical advancements.
Dr. Amar Bhalla recognized by ACerS 2018 Distinguished Life Member Award
Date Posted: 10/20/2018
At American Ceramic Society’s 2018 Annual Meeting, Dr. Amar Bhalla was presented the American Ceramic Society 2018 Distinguished Life Member Award.
“The Distinguished Life Member Award is the highest honor accorded to members of the scientific and technical organization and recognizes the eminent contribution to the ceramic and glass profession.”
A life Member Award is indeed befitting to Dr. Bhalla as he continues on his lifelong and ongoing journey devoting his energy and wisdom in electronic materials research and education. We are all extremely proud to have him to shape our careers and to champion our effort! Congratulations Dr. Bhalla!
UTSA Researchers Set Guinness World Record of “Smallest Medical Robot”
Date Posted: 09/07/2018
UTSA Researchers Set Guinness World Record of “Smallest Medical Robot” (Aug. 2018)
The smallest medical robot measuring a maximum length of 120 nm was demonstrated on November 10th, 2016, by a team of electrical and materials engineering researchers at the University of Texas at San Antonio, San Antonio, Texas, United States. The movement and the functions of this series of incredibly small robots are remotely controlled by magnetic field. These nanorobots have the capabilities to generate on-demand and highly localized electrical pulses that propel their movements. They can interact with biological cells and perform functionalities such as cell targeting, permeation, patterning and transport in bio-cellular environment. This series of nanorobots was created by Soutik Betal (PhD, now at Alfred University) during his doctoral research in Electrical Engineering under the guidance of Professors Ruyan Guo and Amar Bhalla, Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering, and to be used to advance the research in, for example, cell-based therapy that treats cancers or Alzheimer’s diseases. This work is supported in part by NSF (Grant #1002380), The Department of Defense (Grant # W911NF-12-1-0082), and by the Office of the VP for Research, UTSA. The researchers also attribute the advancement in this research to collaborations with faculty and students in ECE (M. Dutta), BME (A.K. Saha; AK Ramasubramanian, B. Shrestha, L. Tang) and Physics (E. Ortega, E. Khachatryan, K. Nash) of UTSA as well as Physics (L.F. Cotica) of State U. Maringa, Brazil.
Research article: Scientific Reports, volume 8, Article number: 1755 (2018) https://www.nature.com/articles/s41598-018-20191-w
MeMDRL Alumni Dr. Moumita Dutta Receives INTEL Divisional Award
Date Posted: 08/21/2018
MeMDRL Alumni Dr. Moumita Dutta (PhD EE Dec. 2017) received INTEL Divisional Award for Outstanding Contribution in Intel’s latest device development. This is a rare honor bestowed upon Dr. Dutta in her first year joined INTEL. Congratulations!
MeMDRL and LANL Collaborative Research Highlighted by DOE Office of Science
Date Posted: 09/06/2018
MeMDRL and Los Alamos National Lab’s innovative research work (Nanoscale 9, 13052 (2017). [DOI: 10.1039/c7nr03504g]) has been selected and highlighted by Department of Energy, the DOE Science News Source under the headline of “Tuning Terahertz Beams with Nanoparticles.”
The research work entitled “Magnetoelastoelectric coupling in core-shell nanoparticles enabling directional and mode-selective magnetic control of THz beam propagation,” was published in Nanoscale, vol. 9, pp. 13052-13059, 2017. The research was conducted by M. Dutta, K. Natarajan, S. Betal, R. P. Prasankumar, A. S. Bhalla, and R. Guo.
Scientists uncover a way to control terahertz radiation using tiny engineered particles in a magnetic field, potentially opening the doors for better medical and environmental sensors. This study shows the potential for engineered nanoparticles to magnetically control terahertz beams. Controlling the amplitude and phase of the beams at the nanoscale offers a range of possibilities. For example, the nanoparticles could enable tiny, high frequency transistors. The particles could also help create wireless networks that let nanorobots work together.
Drs. Guo and Binzaid Developing New Chip at UTSA that extends battery life of electronics
Data Posted: 05/01/2017
MeMDRL under Dr. Ruyan Guo has received a I-Corps grant from the National Science Foundation to commercialize a chip that can make lower power electronics, like cell phones, work more efficiently. Guo’s team developed the technology, which is about the size of a pin’s head, with UTSA researcher Shuza Binzaid in the UTSA Multifunctional Electronic Materials and Devices Research Laboratory alongside graduate student Avadhood Herlekar.